Plea

by Leslie Mellichamp

O singer, sing to me—

I know the world's awry—
I know how piteously
The hungry children cry—

But I bleed warm and near,

And come another dawn
The world will still be here
When home and hearth are gone.

Winter drawing near:

my neighbor,
how does he fare?
― Matsuo Basho, loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch

Come Lord and Lift

by T. Merrill

Come Lord, and lift the fallen bird

Abandoned on the ground;
The soul bereft and longing so
To have the lost be found.

The heart that cries—let it but hear

Its sweet love answering,
Or out of ether one faint note
Of living comfort wring.

What indeed is Earth but a Nest

from whose rim we are all falling?
— Emily Dickinson

Epitaph for a Little Child Lost

by Michael R. Burch

I lived as best I could, and then I died.

Be careful where you step: the grave is wide.
Oh, fallen camellias,
if I were you,
I'd leap into the torrent!
― Takaha Shugyo, loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch

Our life here on earth:

to what shall we compare it?
It is not like a rowboat
departing at daybreak,
leaving no trace of us in its wake?
― Takaha Shugyo, loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch

Which plunderer’s hand

ransacked the pure gold statute of your dreams
In this horrendous storm?
— Nadia Anjuman, Afghani poet

I have torn speech like a tattered robe and let words go;
you who are still dressed in your clothes, sleep on.
— Jalaluddin Rumi, translated by Jack Marshall

The butterfly
perfuming its wings
fans the orchid
— Matsuo Basho, loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch